Miles around London

First off we’d like to say thank you for stopping by and having a look at our new website. What you’ll see here is a children’s book created, written, illustrated and designed by young couple Caroline Harris and Douglas Pledger.

Our story is about a little kitten called Miles who, when one morning speaking to his neighbour, learns that there’s more to the world than just his back garden. Miles lets curiosity get the better of him and sets off to explore his neighbourhood. One thing leads to another and before you know it Miles finds himself in Trafalgar square. It is here whereupon he meets Cabbie, a local streetwise pigeon who takes Miles under his wing on a guided tour of our wonderful capital. Inspired by the travelling cat stories we often see popping up in newpapers. A few examples below. Miles around London is an original, educational and often silly picture book aimed at 4+ year old children. They will learn about many famous landmarks, places, transport and also have various games to play throughout the book. Miles around London is published by Raven Crest Books and you can buy the paperback and EBook on amazon by clicking here. You can also order from Waterstones here. We see Miles travelling the world. A series of 'Miles Around...' books in which each city/country he visits, he meets a new animal (tour guide) who will show him new and exciting places. For instance, in ‘Miles Around Australia’ he’ll be shown around by a kangaroo. We’ve created this picture below to give you an idea. Also, on the right of it are some other fun titles in which Miles could later go on... Just for fun we’ve made some mock-up Miles merchandise as shown below. Depending on how well Miles does we might get some of these made up so do check back. Last but not least, we thought it’d be a nice idea to make a little video of our book. Changed a little from the final product now but something we made when we first tried to get him off the ground. We’re in no way animators so the video is very simple but it's brilliantly brought to life by the wonderful Claire Sturgess who narrates and Mark Nicholson who worked on the sound.

Caroline, 27, works at Enfield Town library in the children’s section, singing to babies in ‘Baby Rhyme Time’ and organising ‘Wonderbooks’, a club for young readers. Outside of work Caroline spends a lot of time drawing and painting. She studied at Central St Martins and Middlesex university. She has had her artwork exhibited at The Old Truman Brewery, Everyman Cinema & Tokarska Gallery. She has done many commissions for Oxfam , Hiitgirl, various private collectors and sells prints of her cityscape drawings at the Frameworks Gallery, Crouch End.

Douglas, 33, also a librarian but at post production film studio Framestore. Douglas has illustrated work for many clients worldwide including The Simpsons, The National Fire Brigade, BBC, Channel 4, Nestle and TalkSport to name a few. Douglas has also taught cartooning to many infant and junior schools up and down the country and continues to follow on in the footsteps of his father, wildlife artist and children’s book author Maurice Pledger.